


Misfire

by dragoninatrenchcoat



Category: Megamind (2010)
Genre: Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-08-10
Updated: 2012-08-10
Packaged: 2017-11-11 19:57:37
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 3
Words: 6,185
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/482323
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/dragoninatrenchcoat/pseuds/dragoninatrenchcoat
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Megamind designed the golden Metrocity Hero Power Infusion for humans, not for himself.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. The Misfire

**Author's Note:**

> This isn't finished, even though it looks like it. I'm not sure how to finish it. If you want to help me out, or adopt it, contact me.

It was a long story as to how they’d wound up there, in the middle of the villain’s own lair, pulling at a golden glowing gadget like it was a toy, but it had a lot to do with the death of a certain hero, the misassumption of an identity, and a difficult struggle through a lair involving a dual role of partner and antagonist by a single blue entity who in all honesty had no idea he was this good at improvising. Now Roxanne and Megamind each had a grip on the expensive and massively important piece of machinery, until someone pressed a button and it went off.  
  
“Oh, no!” Megamind gasped, hugging the empty gun to himself and staring after the golden pellet. It rebounded off of walls, pinged from Minion’s hiding-closet, and zipped from a few desks, until, horrified, he saw it aiming directly for himself. He dropped the gun and tried to dodge, but he was a second too late; the gun’s projectile shot directly up his nose. He hit the ground heavily, groaning.  
  
“Ha ha!” Roxanne said triumphantly. She had no idea what that gun was or what it did, only that Megamind had wanted very badly not to be shot with it. Now he had, so she put her hands on her hips, looked down at him, and said, “Another one of your failed plans, Megamind.”  
  
“No,” he gasped, one hand on his nose. “No, no, this isn’t good, this is very much not good. Give me that!” He reached for the gun with his free hand, bending toward the fallen device, but swiftly Roxanne grabbed it and held it in the crook of her arm, smirking down at him.  
  
“I think I’ll take this,” she asserted, then bolted for the exit.  
  
Minion lifted the fallen closet from himself. “Are you alright, Sir?” he asked, wide-eyed.  
  
Megamind scrambled to his feet and ran after Roxanne. He had her in sight just at the moment she opened the door labeled ‘EXIT’. The alligator pit! “Hold that thought!” he shouted at Minion, then rushed after the reporter. He barely remembered to switch his watch to Bernard before grabbing Roxanne and pulling her out of the fake exit infested by giant lizards.  
  
Surprised, she bounced to her feet and gasped, “You’re right about that door being exciting.” He noticed that she still had the empty infuser gun in her hand.  
  
Brainbots descended from the ceiling, rushing after them, and Megamind mentally deplored them for not recognizing their Daddy. He turned around, pointed ahead, gripped his nose, and told her, “This way.”  
  
They ran that way, pursued by his dimwitted brainbots, and when they passed a table covered in dynamite, the reporter somehow swiped a few sticks and lit them with a brainbot’s jet, despite the fact that she only had one hand.  
  
“What are you doing?” Megamind asked incredulously, his right hand cradling his nose, which was still shot with pain.  
  
“This’ll stop them!” she shouted, and tossed him the lit dynamite. “Here!”  
  
“Whoa!” he cried, the explosive dancing in his hands before he finally caught it. “Seems a bit extreme, doesn’t it?!” he shouted back and attempted to blow out the spark.  
  
“Just throw it!”  
  
He looked back at the brainbots with a grimace. “Daddy’s sorry!” he promised, then threw the bomb back toward their pursuers.  
  
The brainbots, curious about the projected sparkly thing, stopped to investigate. The dynamite exploded and destroyed all seven deployed brainbots as Megamind and Roxanne sped ahead, the former gripping his throbbing nose. The explosion then ignited the rest of the dynamite, propelling the two out through the holographic wall to land hard on the gravel.  
  
They both coughed, lifting themselves from the ground. Megamind looked back toward his lair and cried out in dismay. How much damage had he done?  
  
“Wow,” Roxanne panted, “That was exiting.”  
  
“Yeah,” Megamind agreed, putting a hand absentmindedly on his nose, which still hurt.  
  
“You were pretty strong in there.”  
  
“I know.” He looked at the reporter wide-eyed.  
  
“I’ve never seen anyone but Metro Man stand up to...” She drifted off. “Are you alright?”  
  
“Hmm?” he asked. “Oh, yeah, it’s nothing.” They stood up, brushing themselves off.  
  
“Roxanne!” Hal shouted. “Did you do that? Of course, I was just about to launch my frontal assault to rescue you, but like fifty ninjas attacked me so I had to beat ‘em all up, which I did, and they were all crying and stuff-”  
  
Megamind reached for the gun in Roxanne’s hand. “What is that? Can I see that?”  
  
“Oh, this?” She smirked and held it up triumphantly. “I don’t know exactly what it did, but Megamind wants it, so I’m keeping it.”  
  
“Oh, no, let me have it,” Megamind insisted, his hand still pressed over Bernard’s pink nose. “If you have it, he’ll come after you. You’ll be in danger.”  
  
Hal looked at him, affronted. “Who are you?” he asked.  
  
Roxanne gestured at him. “This is Bernard. He’s my partner.”  
  
“Partner?” the cameraman echoed, insulted.  
  
Megamind’s eyebrows rose, and he smiled a little. Him, Roxanne’s partner? “Yes,” he said. “Yes, partner.” The word settled on his tongue in a curiously refreshing way.  
  
“You’re not her partner,” Hal said quickly. “I’m her partner. She doesn’t even know what she’s saying. She’s been through a traumatic experience.”  
  
“I should take him home,” Roxanne said, with a smile that told him to ignore every word out of Hal’s mouth. “Thanks again. Bernard.” She looked at him gratefully, then engulfed him in a hug.  
  
That was the first time in his life Megamind received a hug from a non-fish, non-robot living being. His Bernard-eyes widened in pure surprise and he smiled, slowly hugging her back.  
  
She broke apart from him too early. “I’ll check up on you later, partner,” she said, and punched him lightly in the shoulder with her free hand.  
  
“Yeah, okay,” he replied, entranced. “I’d like that.”  
  
They started to walk away, Hal muttering something about that having been really awkward, and then a glint of sunlight caught Megamind’s eye and he suddenly remembered why he’d followed her out here in the first place. “Roxanne!” he called after her.  
  
She turned around. “What is it?”  
  
“The gun. I can look after it for you.” He reached toward it.  
  
Her grip seemed to tighten around it. “That’s alright. I’m sure I can handle anything that bigheaded villain has in store for me. I’ll just hide this somewhere he’ll never find it.”  
  
“Yeah, like my place,” he suggested hopefully.  
  
She laughed. “I’ll be fine, Bernard. Go home, get some rest. Put some ice on your nose.”  
  
He rubbed his swollen nose again. “But-”  
  
“See you later,” she promised, then got in the car and drove away.  
  
He watched the car drive off, both frustrated and entranced at the same time.  
 _  
“Sir?”_ asked his watch, _“Sir? Code: Did you get the infuser gun?”  
_   
“Huh?” he asked, looking over his shoulder. “Oh.” Megamind pressed his finger on the watch, removing the mattergraph. “Code: I didn’t get it. Roxanne drove off with it.”  
 _  
“Oh, no!”_ Minion cried through the watch. _ “We needed that to make a hero! Can you make a new one?”  
_   
“Of course not,” he sighed, “and even if we could, making a new hero isn’t our foremost problem! I designed this Metro Man serum stuff for humans, so I -” a wave of lightheadedness suddenly took Megamind over, and he stumbled, gripping his head in his slender hand. “I don’t know what kinds of effects it might have on me. We need to get that gun back.”  
  
 _“How do we do that, Sir?”  
_   
Megamind looked at his hand, which was glowing waves of yellow-gold. He took off his glove to see that the radiating golden particles looked more like an unseemly green against his skin. Hurriedly he slid his glove back on and pressed his watch to reply. “Code: get the car.”  
  
 _“Code: right away, Sir.”_


	2. Apartment Building

Megamind felt quite the worse for wear as they drove toward Roxanne’s apartment. He’d been sick a few times in the past, but not for very long, and not with anything that utterly horrible. Now he sat in the passenger seat with two fingers on his temple, trying to work out just what, exactly, they would do when they reached the reporter’s building, and getting distracted by stupid things like the temperature and the way his hands couldn’t quite keep still for some reason.  
  
Minion looked over at him from the wheel. “Are you okay, Sir?”  
  
“I’m fine, Minion,” he sighed.  
  
The fish looked back at the road, then turned to him again. “Are you sure? You’re not looking that well. I could go drop you off at the lair and get the gun on my own, Sir. You look like you need some rest.”  
  
The blue alien sighed. “You’ll need my brilliant mind to formulate this plan. And anyway, I’m perfectly healthy enough to steal a defuser gun.”  
  
“Oh, yeah? Hold your hand out flat.”  
  
Megamind held his palm out, but it was shaking too vigorously to properly keep flat. “It’s a bumpy road,” he insisted, and dropped his hand.  
  
“Ah huh,” Minion agreed, nonplussed. “And the sweat on your forehead is what, condensation?”  
  
“Just drive, Minion.”  
  
“Alright, but as soon as we’re done here we’re going straight back to the lair. I want to have a good long look at you.”  
  
Roxanne Richi’s building was unimpressive for a building, and rather unsurprisingly mediocre for an apartment building. There was a doorman in the lobby by the street, and balconies on every floor, but the apartments, for the most part, were pretty small. Of course, Megamind and Minion had seen the reporter’s apartment many times before; after all, they favored class and style, and didn’t prefer to kidnap her the same way twice, so they ended up finding new and innovative ways and places to snatch Roxanne Richi. Unfortunately, the invisible car couldn’t fly, and the flying bike was unnaturally loud, so visits to her balcony had been few and far between.  
  
They parked just outside the building, toward the alley where there was less chance of being mistakenly rammed into. “What’s the plan, Sir?” Minion asked, shutting off the ignition.  
  
“She probably still has the gun,” Megamind thought out loud. “She wouldn’t have had time to drop off that incongruously creepy cameraman of hers. If we can sneak into her building and hide, we can snatch it from her when she gets here.”  
  
“Sneak into the building, Sir?” the fish echoed uneasily. “There’s a doorman, and people would probably recognize -”  
  
“That’s why we have this,” the alien explained, an held up his De- gun. “Instant witness removal!”  
  
“But what if Miss Richi gets here and notices she doesn’t have a doorman? Don’t you think she’d suspect something?”  
  
Megamind looked over at his best friend, whose wide, brown eyes read concern. “Then I suppose disguises are in order.”  
  
At that, Minion’s face lit up. “Oh, I’ve been wanting to try mine out!” he said excitedly.  
  
“It’s a plan then!” Megamind announced, thrusting his finger into the air. Then he shuddered convulsively.  
  
The fish looked at him. “Uh, Sir...”  
  
“Shut up I’m fine,” Megamind said quickly, set his watch to the newly concocted old-man setting, and got out of the car. He’d reserved this setting for training the new hero, whoever it would turn out to be, but Bernard’s supposed to be at home and someone might recognize the Warden.  
  
He looked through the car at Minion’s disguise: a pink apron and blonde wig.  
  
“What?” Minion asked defensively.  
  
“You look great,” Megamind answered and tottled around the car. “We look like an old, lost couple.”  
  
The fish looked down at him, horrified. “What do you mean, old? I’m not old!”  
  
He sighed. “We look like a lost couple,” he amended. “Follow my lead.”  
  
Megamind put his hand in Minion’s robotic gorilla hand and hobbled toward the door. He glanced at some of the names listed beside the door before approaching the doorman, a young hispanic man who seemed to be trying hard to grow in a beard. “Hello, sir,” Megamind greeted frailly.  
  
“How can I help you?” the doorman asked politely.  
  
“Well, we’re, ah,” he remembered the list of names, “Anderson’s parents. We wanted to surprise him today. It’s his birthday!”  
  
“It is?” The doorman looked surprised. “He looked a bit sad this morning.”  
  
“Oh, that’s our little Andy,” Minion cooed, covering his mouth with a giant metal hand. “So modest!”  
  
“Could you be a nice young man and let us in?” Megamind asked. “We’d love to wait for him at home.”  
  
“Um, sure,” he agreed. “Do you have a key?”  
  
Minion and Megamind shared a worried glance.  
  
“It’s just, how are you going to wait for him at his place if you don’t have a key?” The doorman raised an eyebrow at them.  
  
“Oh, a key!” Megamind exclaimed, laughing and shocking the doorman with his sudden volume. “Yes, we do have a key. Of course we’d have a key! Isn’t that right honey?”  
  
“Oh, yes,” Minion agreed. “He gave it to us quite a while ago.”  
  
The doorman looked between them for a moment, then shrugged and opened the door for them. “You are such sweet people. All my parents do on my birthday is give me a shirt or something.”  
  
Megamind walked into the apartment building, and Minion followed, smiling at the doorman. “Well, on your next birthday you remember to call us. I make the best birthday cake of the whole neighborhood. We’ll make a day of it.”  
  
The alien disguised as an old man turned around and motioned urgently for Minion to follow him. The fish nodded at the doorman then jogged after his friend.  
  
“What was that?” Megamind asked once the door was closed.  
  
“Well, I felt sorry for him. A birthday is an important celebration of-”  
  
“Shh!” He held out a hand toward Minion as he peered down the hall, listening. “There’s someone here.”  
  
“There’s probably a lot of people here, Sir, it’s a large building.”  
  
“Shh!” he repeated. A mother and child turned the corner. Megamind and Minion smiled and waved at them in unison. After they passed, Megamind pointed and said, “El-eviters: this way.”  
  
They jogged over to the elevator and pressed the call button.  
  
“What are we going to do, wait in Miss Richi’s apartment? How will we get in?”  
  
“Look at the size of my head, Minion,” he said, and pointed. Then he realized he still looked like an old man. “Well, that is, remember it. Do you really think a simple lock could be a challenge to me?”  
  
The elevator _ dinged_ its presence and the doors slid open. The couple walked in and Megamind pressed Roxanne’s floor number.  
  
It made a clunking sound, then started to rise, though so slowly that it might not have been moving at all.  
  
Megamind removed his mattergraph. “Can this thing move any faster?” he complained.  
  
“Sir?” Minion asked. “Are you alright?”  
  
Megamind leaned against the elevator wall as though on the verge of collapsing, his blue skin coated with a sheen of sweat. Despite this, he rolled his bright, green eyes. “How many times are you going to ask? I’m perfectly f-” his eyes bulged and his cheeks puffed, and he slapped a hand to his mouth, lurching. “I think I’m going to puke.”  
  
“Oh, I think I have some antacids,” Minion said helpfully, rifling through his apron pockets.  
  
Before he could find one, Megamind retched - or rather, he felt he was going to. Instead, he merely exhaled a stream of air, then fell onto the ceiling. “Ow!” he exclaimed. “I didn’t know throwing up was so painful!”  
  
Minion looked up at him, wide-eyed. His best friend was sprawled across the ceiling, his eyes rolling. “Sir!” he said, surprised.  
  
Megamind finally focused his eyes, looking down at Minion. “What are you doing up there?” he asked.  
  
“I think you mean down, Sir,” Minion helped, pointing. “You’re on the ceiling.”  
  
“What?” He sat up, rubbing his head. Then he looked around, his eyes widening at each glance. “Wait, why am I on the ceiling?”  
  
“Do you think this has something to do with the infuser gun?”  
  
“Well, of course it - aah!” He fell back to the floor, landing heavily on his stomach. “The universe hates me,” he grumbled, then pressed against the floor with trembling hands. Minion helped him to his feet.  
  
The elevator _dinged_  again and the doors opened. Megamind’s eyes were spinning as they stepped out into the hall, and he gripped his head with a gloved hand before falling heavily against the robot. Minion heard footsteps echoing from around a corner and hurriedly turned Megamind’s watch, not paying attention to the setting.  
  
A woman stepped around the corner and stopped when she saw them. “Oh!” she exclaimed, “is he alright?”  
  
“What? Nothing! Who?” Minion said, high-strung. Then he looked at Bernard’s form all but limp in his arms. “Oh. Um. Not really.”  
  
She jogged over to them. Her hair was blonde and long, pulled back in a ponytail. Her brown eyes were full of concern. “I’m a medical student. I might be able to help.”  
  
“You know, I really doubt that,” Minion replied, “but thanks. I think he just needs to lie down.”  
  
Without asking permission, she put her hand on Bernard’s large, flat forehead, whose bright green eyes flickered in response. “He’s too hot,” she concluded. “He has a fever. I’ll need to take his temperature but in the meantime we have to get him someplace cool.”  
  
“Excuse me,” Minion said, affronted. “I know perfectly well how to treat a fever, thank you very much. And I-”  
  
Megamind groaned and his legs gave out from under him. Minion caught him before he fell. “Sir!” he exclaimed.  
  
“Where’s your apartment?” she asked.  
  
“I can look after him on my own, I promise,” Minion asserted, but looked both ways down the hall exasperatedly. Roxanne’s apartment was down the right hand side and past a few turns, but it probably would be a pretty horrible idea to tend to Sir there - and not even the kind of good-bad horrible Megamind had gone on about.  
  
“You can come to mine,” she offered, pointing at a door just a few feet away. “It’s closer.”  
  
Minion grimaced. He just needed to rejuvenate Megamind before Miss Richi got back. “Fine,” he said grudgingly. The student didn’t seem to notice his tone - or, even, the fact that he was actually a fish in a gorilla suit dressed up as a woman. Instead, she motioned for him to follow, unlocking her door and holding it open for him. “Thanks,” he said, realizing he’d sounded impolite.  
  
“No problem,” she chirped, and closed the door behind him.  
  
Her apartment was small and messy. There were clothes spilling out of the bedroom and pieces of trash everywhere. Minion wrinkled the area of his face where his nose should be as he surveyed the place; if he ever saw the lair in this state, he would have assumed some kind of cataclysmic event had occurred. If the Brain Bots weren’t cleaning, then he was, and so were the Lightning-Vacs Megamind had invented. Or at least, they had used to, before he saw them eating his blueprints and cutting down his string notes.  
  
The student walked forward into the mess without so much as a blink. She cleared junk off of the couch - by throwing it on the floor - and motioned. “Here. What’s your friend’s name?”  
  
“Uh,” Minion floundered. What had he called this shape again? “Oh. Uh, Bernard, I think.”  
  
She procured a wet washcloth from the catastrophe that at some point or another must have been her kitchen and draped it across Megamind’s forehead, then grabbed a flashlight from some random point on the floor - how had she known that was there? - and shone it in his eye, pulling up an eyelid. She moved the light into and away from his eye consecutively, watching his pupil dilate. Then she copied the movement with his other eye. “Wow,” she commented. “What pretty green eyes you have, Bernard.”  
  
Minion was uncomfortable with the whole affair. He stepped between the two of them. “Look, I’m sorry, miss...?”  
  
“Lexie. Lexie Adams.”  
  
“Miss Adams,” Minion continued, “Thank you for the...” he glanced disdainfully at her apartment, “accommodations, but I think I can handle it from here.”  
  
Lexie looked a little disappointed, but shrugged. “Alright. I did what I can, I guess. I have medicine in the bathroom cabinets if you need any. I have to do something online, so I’ll get out of your hair.” She grinned at him before picking her way into her bedroom.  
  
“I don’t ever want to see your bathroom,” Minion said to himself, grimacing. Then he bent down to Megamind’s side, getting Evil-Heaven-knows-what on his synthetic leg fur, and set the watch back to its natural setting.  
  
Megamind was completely out of it. Minion knew coming here was a bad idea. He knew it. But he went along, because no matter what he could say, nothing could change that bigheaded alien’s mind once he’d made a decision. After clenching a metal fist in frustration, he pulled out a needle-like device from an apron pocket. He removed a plastic cap, then pulled off Megamind’s glove and inserted the needle into his arm. When the device beeped, he removed it and replaced the villain’s glove, then checked the display on the side.  
  
Wow, that wasn’t actually that bad. Only a few degrees higher than normal. Minion smiled. He knew much more about Megamind’s physiology than anyone else on the planet - except, possibly, Megamind himself. He could contract diseases somewhat easily - which he hardly ever did, because both Megamind and himself were excellent at keeping clean, unlike a _certain someone_ \- but he could also heal abnormally quickly. He may have dipped into a high fever after leaving the elevator, but once he fell into a failsafe comatose state it would take less than ten percent of the time for him to heal than it would have for a human. He was already practically normal.  
  
Megamind groaned.  
  
“Sir!” Minion said, delighted. “How are you feeling?”  
  
“Like someone threw me on the floor,” he answered. “Did we get the gun?”  
  
“No, Miss Richi isn’t here yet.”  
  
“Well, she should be soon.” He sat up in his seat. “You know, I knew it wouldn’t be good, getting shot with that thing, but you’d think _something_ positive would have happened. Ever since I got infused, it’s been nothing but headaches and non-vomiting.”  
  
“You didn’t design the serum for yourself, Sir-”  
  
“Yes, I know that, Minion,” he said derisively, shaking his head. Then he looked at the ground and let out a startled cry. “Where on Earth are we?” he asked. “The Dump?”  
  
Minion sighed. “Just some girl’s apartment, Sir. I promise we’ll leave as soon as you’re well enough.”  
  
Megamind pulled up his feet onto the couch, eyeing the junk-drenched floor suspiciously.  
  
“Oh!” a voice called from the bedroom, as Lexie shuffled loud-sounding things around in an effort to get to the door, “Is he awake?”  
  
Megamind looked down at himself worriedly. “She didn’t see me like this, did she?” he hissed, wide-eyed.  
  
“No,” Minion answered urgently. “Bernard. She saw Bernard.”  
  
He glanced toward the bedroom and hurriedly switched his mattergraph watch to the appropriate setting. Then he registered the horrible mess he’d seen through the doorway to the bedroom and clenched his eyes shut, but the image was already seared into his mind.  
  
Lexie jogged back into the room, beaming. “How are you feeling?” she chirped.  
  
“Like a bee flew up my nose and poisoned my entire muscular system,” he complained. When he saw her look of complete misapprehension, he sighed. “Kidding. I’m fine, if a little tired.”  
  
She shook her head, relieved. “You know, I’ve only been in school for a few months but I looked up your condition. I think you should get a lot of rest and -”  
  
Megamind gasped involuntarily, then suddenly, and quite explosively, convulsed into a sneeze and disappeared. Lexie screamed.  
  
Minion jumped back from where his friend had just been. “S-Sir?” he stuttered, looking around the apartment.


	3. Bernard, Again

Megamind collapsed on hard ground. His hands rubbed grey pavement and his nostrils filled with the assaulting smoke of asphalt. “Oh,” he sighed, “Can this day get any worse?”  
  
He gasped when he heard his fears answered. It sounded like the loud honk of a horn and squealing tires. He was too weak to run - when would he get over this stage already? Even though he wasn’t human, the serum should have stabilized by now - so he merely cringed as the car behind him screeched to a halt. He heard a door open.  
  
“Bernard?!” a familiar voice exclaimed.  
  
Megamind instantly sat up and whipped his head around, spinning the world for a moment. The car behind him was the Channel 8 News van. The woman standing shocked beside it was Roxanne.  
  
She raced toward him, her shoes slapping the pavement. “Bernard, what are you - how did you -”  
  
“I don’t know,” he said, pushing his glasses up. It was a white lie - he knew what was wrong with him, but he had no idea what was happening to him. He let her help him up. He had no clue how he got from that garbage dump of an apartment to the middle of the street, but he wasn’t about to look a gift horse in the mouth; he’d ended up right in front of Roxanne Richi, who might still have the gun.  
  
“Are you alright?”  
  
He leaned on her as he stood. “Um, probably not,” he said honestly. “Where am I?”  
  
“We’re not far from my building,” Roxanne said, looking him concernedly in the eyes. He didn’t seem to be focusing on anything. “Where... were you?”  
  
Megamind looked around himself, recognizing the street. The invisible car wasn’t far away; he could see its shimmer down a few blocks. He quickly looked away, realizing he shouldn’t draw attention to that area of the street; only three living people could easily identify that car, and those people were himself, Minion, and Roxanne. If she saw it there, she’d surely know he was in the building.  
  
Instead he shifted around her so her back was facing her building as he gazed around. “I was...” his eyes shifted. “Here. I was walking to my place. I just... tripped.”  
  
Roxanne furrowed her eyebrows. She hadn’t seen any pedestrians. She could have sworn she’d seen Bernard appear in the middle of the road. But that was impossible, wasn’t it? She shook her head. Maybe he had been walking. “Did you hit your head?” she asked, still supporting some of his weight.  
  
“No,” he said uncertainly.  
  
She sighed into a smile. “Good. Here, at least let me drive you home.”  
  
“Um,” Megamind said. He didn’t have a home to direct her to, but being in her car gave him a great chance to find the gun. “Alright,” he acquiesced. “Thank you so much.”  
  
Roxanne led him to the passenger door and helped him lumber up into the seat, then closed the door behind him. He peered into the back of the truck, and saw nothing - some television equipment, dusty and shut off, but nothing else. Nothing even vaguely shaped like a gun.  
  
When the reporter was in the driver’s seat, he turned to her and asked, “What’d you do with the gun?”  
  
She smirked at him. “I told you. I hid it in a place Megamind will never find it.”  
  
His look of horror went unnoticed as she set the van back in motion. “Wh... where?”  
  
She waved a hand. “That’s not important right now. How are you feeling?”  
  
“Oh, fine, I’m fine,” he asserted, but as he spoke he began to feel weak. He deflated in his seat, looking down. He felt his glasses slipping and pushed them up along the bridge of his nose.  
  
Roxanne glanced over at him. “You don’t look fine.” After a short pause, she added, “Maybe I should take you to a hospital.”  
  
“No!” he said a bit forcefully, jerking his head up toward her. He quickly amended, “I mean, no, I think I’m fine. I don’t have the, er, money for a hospital trip.”  
  
“Are you sure?”  
  
“Yeah.” He paused. “Uhm... so, uh, what kind of place were -”  
  
“Where’s your place again?” Roxanne studied the road.  
  
“Oh, it’s ahead,” he said vaguely. “Just a...” he wheezed. It was suddenly hard to breathe. “A... a way...” He gasped, a hand on his chest.  
  
“Bernard?!” she asked, alarmed. He dimly felt her pull the van over as he focused on his lungs, which felt like they were moving through sludge.  
 _  
Not here,_ he thought in a panic. _ Not now! Not like this! Not here! Not in front of her!_  
  
He closed his eyes and gasped, drawing in air like he had a huge weight on his chest. He felt himself slowing down, his muscles tingling and growing stiff. There was a loud ringing in his ears and he felt his head grow cloudy. There was a gust of cool wind on his side - Roxanne had opened his door. He tried to look at her, but his eyelids were heavy.  
  
In fact, he... he couldn’t move at all. His heart pumped in panic and he tried to inhale more air to make up for it, but his lungs were still slow and his mouth wouldn’t move; it was stuck partly open, air flowing into his mouth between his jaws. His hand was clamped like stone on his chest, and for a moment he worried that his lungs and heart would stop, too.  
  
To Megamind’s massive relief, they didn’t. After a few moments, during which he saw nothing but the inside of his eyelids and heard nothing but the loud ringing in his ears, feeling began to come back to his arms and it became slightly easier to breathe. He forced his eyes open and gasped, his jaw moving slowly, then closed his mouth and swallowed.  
  
He wasn’t in the van anymore. His legs slowly fell from a ninety-degree position to lay flat on the sidewalk, and his arms dropped to support him, even though Roxanne’s arms were already around him, holding him up. He was staring directly into her huge, blue eyes.  
  
The villain was speechless. He’d never noticed how beautiful her eyes were before. He stared up into them, his condition, for a moment, forgotten. He could stare at her eyes forever.  
  
“Bernard,” Roxanne breathed.  
  
Reality smacked into Megamind again and he looked away from her gaze, wondering what had come over him. Roxanne had always been beautiful, but... he put a hand on his throat, which had gone dry, and tried to sit up on his own.  
  
“What happened? You were like a statue,” she continued, her blue gaze full of concern.  
  
“I’m fine,” he said, his voice a little hoarse. “It’s a... condition. I’m fine.”  
  
“Don’t you have a doctor I could take you to, or... or medicine? You should really go to the hospital,” she repeated.  
  
“Nope, no need for that.” He stood up and his stomach churned. _This is just getting worse and worse! I should have let Minion take me back to the Lair! _ “I think I should walk,” he suggested. “Fresh air and exercise. That’s what the doctor ordered.”  
  
She looked dubious. “I really don’t think that’s a great idea, Bernard. I think you just had a seizure. You really need to get checked out.”  
  
He held a hand up to her, the other cradling his stomach. He was going to get sick again, and it was going to be the same non-vomit air-sick as it had been in the elevator, except that there wasn’t a ceiling here. This wasn’t going to end well. Maybe if he let her take him into the van -  
  
Before he could say anything either way, he retched. Like before, he only let loose a stream of air, but instead of up, he fell sideways - both luckily and unluckily, however you looked at it, right into the van.  
  
Roxanne gasped as Megamind groaned, laying on the side of the van. He rolled over onto his back and laid there for a moment, staring straight up at the side of a building.  
  
“You’re going to a hospital,” the reporter concluded. “I’ll pay for it myself if I have to. You have to get checked out right away.”  
  
He looked at her. She was below him slightly, standing on the sidewalk-wall, and he had to crane his neck a bit to look at her, raising his head from the floor of the side of the van. He had to admit: this looked bad. Too tired to argue, he let his head fall back onto the metal.  
  
This day was not going well.  
  
Roxanne had gone to somehow help him off the van when gravity re-righted itself and he fell to the ground with a shout of dismay. He briefly considered running off as he pushed himself from the ground, his head swimming, but he doubted he’d get far. Maybe, while Roxanne wasn’t looking, he could shift the mattergraph to the Warden and pass it off that Bernard had disappeared - though it was a gamble whether or not she’d recognize him. Maybe he’d sneeze again and end up somewhere new.  
  
As he contemplated this, the reporter helped him into the van again. When she pulled out into the street, however, it was to turn around. Megamind grew alarmed. “Wh-where are we going?” he asked nervously.  
  
“The hospital,” Miss Ritchi said, “whether you like it or not.”  
  
“This is kidnapping,” Megamind said, grasping for excuses.  
  
Roxanne barked a laugh. “Me, Roxanne Ritchi, kidnap someone? Besides, you’ll thank me later, when the doctors know what’s wrong with you and fix it.”  
  
He shook his head. Human doctors wouldn’t know what to do with him. And what would Roxanne do if she found out who he really was? Scream, hit him, run off? Or - he cringed at the thought - would she laugh at him? No, he couldn’t let it get that far.  
  
The reporter gasped, drawing his attention. “What is it?” Megamind asked.  
  
They were passing by her apartment, and her eyes were fixed on one point. The invisible car. “Megamind,” she said, and he winced at the malice in her voice, though he couldn’t fathom why.  
  
“M-Megamind?” he asked, trying to sound confused.  
  
“He’s at my apartment.” She drove past the building, chewing her lip. “He’s probably waiting for me, in order to get the gun back. But...”  
  
When she didn’t elaborate, he prompted. “But?”  
  
She shook her head. “It’s not like him. To just drive to my apartment and wait for me to get home? He’s not usually so straightforward. He usually has some big plan, with robots or disguises and a lot of flashing lights.”  
  
“Maybe the gun’s just really important to him,” Megamind helped.  
  
Roxanne sighed. “That’s what I’m worried about. What _ is _ it?” She paused for a long moment, and he could see concern in her wide, blue gaze.  
  
After a bit of silence, the villain said, “It can’t be anything too terrible, can it? After all, he was the one shot by it, and he’s -”  
  
“He’s right behind us!” Roxanne exclaimed.  
  
“What?” Megamind asked, confused, and turned around in his seat to see the invisible car right on their tail. Minion must have activated the homing beacon on his watch and found out he was in the news van. _Good work, you fantastic fish!  
_   
“I have to shake him off,” she said, and turned a sharp corner.  
  
Every move Roxanne made, Minion copied it. Megamind hadn’t known Minion was such a good driver! He made a mental note to commend him for it. Roxanne, however, grew impatient and annoyed.  
  
“This isn’t working!” she eventually groaned. “I’m going to have to go somewhere high-traffic where he won’t be able to take the car without getting into an accident.”  
  
“No!” Megamind shouted, then realized his mistake. “I mean - don’t we have to go to the hospital?”  
  
She shrugged. “Alright. Two birds with one stone. There’s usually a lot of traffic over there.”  
  
He grimaced. “Actually, I just remembered, I have medicine at my place. Maybe if we could-”  
  
“Bernard, I told you, I’m taking you to the hospital.”  
  
This was most decidedly not going well. He hoped Minion caught up to them. Maybe Megamind could ‘kidnap’ Bernard and threaten to kill him unless Roxanne brought the gun.  
  
But that seemed... wrong somehow. Even though they’ve kidnapped before, even though Bernard wasn’t a real person, it just... wasn’t right when Roxanne wasn’t the victim. Perhaps he’d just been doing it for so long with her as the victim that he felt it was the only way to do a proper kidnapping. But that couldn’t be right, either. He shook his head and felt the heat of another fever coming on.  
  
 _When is this going to stop?  
_  
He blacked out.


End file.
